Emil Olson's Early Station

Said to Be the First Station in Spokane to Broadcast
Music

Sketchy Information About Emil's Station

Information about early radio stations in Spokane is sketchy
and mostly anecdotal. That is no less true for the account about
Emil Olson's station, which according to Carl Partlow, was
the first station to play music in Spokane. According to the 1920
and 1930 censuses, Emil V. Olson worked as a clerk for Washington
Water Power (WWP). At least one account by an old-time radio
technician suggests he may have also been in-charge of linemen at
the WWP (1).

Before the Department of Commerce issued licenses, many
amateur station operators like Emil would experiment with
broadcasting speech and music. Emil's station appears to have
been well known in Spokane at the time it was on the air.

Roger Williams Description of Emil's Station

Roger Williams of Spokane and later Worley, Idaho, who
visited Emil's home numerous times (2), in a letter to
Thorwald Jorgenson dated 10 March 1980 related the following
account of Emil's station. [COMMENT: The following is a
verbatim transcription of Roger's letter. No changes to the
grammar or the spelling were made.]

"I do remember Emil Olson well since I plagued him with
quite a few visits. The Olson Family lived on the southwest
corner of 18th and Adams, one block down from the house my family
built and occupied about 1910. There was amateur activity of some
sort by the Olson brothers prior to WW 1. The antenna remained up
throughout the war years although the brothers were gone. When
Emil returned, he had been mustered out with the rank of Major,
Signal Corps. He then built or found a small house up in the
scrub pine. The location is hazy but I remember going to the end
of the car line (Cannon Hill or Grand Ave.?) and walking east the
equivalent of few blocks on a dirt road. There were no curbings
or side walks there then. If the address is important a telephone
directory of about 1921 would show it. He was unmarried, I think
at least a sister lived with him. Since he worked for the
Washington Water Power then and probably for the rest of his
active life he had access to cedar poles and the manpower to set
them. The antenna used two such poles. It was flat top of three
to five wires with the usual spreaders. A counterpoise was strung
below at perhaps eight to ten feet. The length was a couple
hundred feet or so.

"The thing that broadcast the music was a very well made
breadboard which used one tube as the oscillator and one as
modulator. The modulation system was according to Heising. The
two tubes had the same envelope as the Western Electric long line
repeater amplifiers of that time but no doubt they were liberated
Signal Corps VT-2s. The VT-2 was used as an RF oscillator or
amplifier and was rated at 5 watts. What actually fed those
tubes, I don't know but they ran a nice cherry red and they
were fueled by a beautiful little ESCO motor generator set which
one would scarcely fool with or afford for the nominal 200 volts
or so rating called for. Sound pick up was by microphone from a
table top Victrola or other player. He operated under the amateur
call 7MA. The frequency is unknown but probably as close to 1500
kHz as could be. Frequency was set by a Ham version of General
Radio wavemeter. That was the only transmitter around but the
receiving gear was extensive and elaborate covering the spectrum
from VLF to as high as things went in those days. A loose couple
with loading coils on the side gave way to honeycomb coils when
they became available. The favorite detector tube was the
Audiotron mounted in a clip on a false tube base to fit the old
four pin shell type socket which had been built in liberated VT-1
no doubt. The Audiotron you will remember was an unmounted
tubular affair with pig tails. There were two filaments. One in
use and a spare. Filament voltage was four volts. At least I was
using a two cell storage battery on mine. Unhappily for the life
of the tube occluded gasses hadn't been effectively scavenged
or the seals were poor. It developed a nice blue glow all too
soon."

No Official Information Found Yet

It is not known when Emil's station first signed on with
voice and music, but according to Ed Craney of KFDC and KFPY
fame, Emil's station was on the air when KFDC obtained its
license in 1922. No official records of this station have been
found. The author has searched for a record of 7MA, Emil's
amateur callsign, but to no avail as of this writing.

COMMENTS:

Emil V. Olson was found in the 1920 and 1930 US Federal
Census. His listed occupations were statistic clerk for a
"Light and Power Co." in 1920 and sales clerk for a
"Water Power Co." in 1930. Partlow suggests in his
notes that he was in charge of the linemen at the WWP. This has
not been confirmed.

The exact location of his station has not been confirmed. In
1920, his family was enumerated in the Aurora Precinct listed as
"103 29th Avenue." In 1930, his family was enumerated
in block number 1037 and was listed at "E. 1218 17th
Avenue." That address was confirmed by Dean Carriveau who
looked it up in the 1938 Pacific Telephone directory. More
research is needed. The Spokane City Directories of that time may
shed some light on his addresses.

About Roger Williams

Roger Williams was born in Spokane on 13 May 1907 and died in
Tacoma in June 1999. He lived in Spokane until about 1923 and
subsequently joined the Navy where he served until the close of
the 1950's. Before he left Spokane, he became acquainted with
Emil Olson and apparently spent a lot of time with him. After his
military service he returned to Spokane and then to Worley, Idaho
where he retired. While Mr. Williams was a young man when
Emil's station was active, and it is difficult to judge his
ability to recall events, which happened some 50 years
previously, his first hand account provides a good insight into
what kind of station that Emil Olson operated.